For Immediate Release
June 27th, 2013
Contacts: Sarah Polus, sarahp@essic.umd.edu
Miralles-Wilhelm Appointed as CICS Executive Director
COLLEGE PARK, MD – The Cooperative Institute for Climate and Satellites (CICS), a cooperative institute between the University of Maryland, College Park (UMCP) and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has announced the appointment of a new Executive Director, effective July 1, 2013.
Dean of the UMCP College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences (CMNS), Jayanth R. Banavar, based on the recommendation of the CICS Executive Board, announced the selection of UMD Professor Fernando Miralles-Wilhelm from a pool of highly qualified applicants.
Miralles-Wilhelm, a hydrologist and water resources engineer, has a mechanical engineering diploma from Universidad Simón Bolívar in Venezuela, a master’s in engineering from the University of California-Irvine, and a doctorate of philosophy in civil and environmental engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
Miralles-Wilhelm will succeed UMCP Senior Research Scientist, Dr. Phillip Arkin, who has served as institute Executive Director since 2009.
CICS performs collaborative research aimed at enhancing NOAA’s ability to use satellite observations and Earth System models to advance the national climate mission, including monitoring, understanding, predicting and communicating information on climate variability and change.
The UMCP Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center (ESSIC) hosts and administers CICS, which consists of CICS-MD, CICS-NC, and a broad consortium of participating scientists and institutions. CICS is sponsored by the NOAA National Satellite, Data, and Information Services (NESDIS) and the NOAA National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP).
CICS-NC is an Inter-Institutional Research Center (IRC) of the UNC System, administered by North Carolina State University and affiliated with several of the UNC academic institutions, as well as a number of other academic and community partners. CICS-NC focuses primarily on the collaborative research into the use of satellite observations in climate research and applications that will be led by the National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) of NOAA/NESDIS.
Media Contacts
Sarah Polus
sarahp@essic.umd.edu
Earth System Interdisciplinary Center
